


February, 2006

by JJK



Series: Life, Interrupted [15]
Category: Les Misérables - All Media Types
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Alternate Universe - The Time Traveler's Wife, Established Enjolras/Grantaire, Grantaire's Birthday, It starts sad, M/M, OC Character Death, Time Travel, but gets fluffier, car crash, multiple grantaires
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-04-23
Updated: 2017-04-23
Packaged: 2018-10-23 03:45:16
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,422
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10711512
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/JJK/pseuds/JJK
Summary: Grantaire screwed his eyes shut and willed himself not to Travel. He knew exactly where he was slipping off to and it was the last place he wanted to go.





	February, 2006

**Author's Note:**

> So this wasn't the chapter that I sat down to write, but never mind! I hope you enjoy it. Fair warning: this starts pretty sad, but it gets fluffier at the end (though Kim tells me a 'bittersweet' sort of fluffy, so consider yourselves warned). More warnings in the end note.

_February, 2006_ ( _Grantaire is 34, Enjolras is 30)_

Grantaire woke with static buzzing in his temples. He opened his eyes, blearily, and frowned as the room swam before him. Dammit, he was too tired to Travel. Was he not even allowed to sleep in anymore?

“Morning,” Enjolras mumbled next to him, stirring slightly and throwing an arm across Grantaire’s chest. He hummed contentedly and nuzzled his head into Grantaire’s shoulder.  

Grantaire tried to focus on the warmth of Enjolras’ body next to him, on the faint trickle of Enjolras’ blonde curls as they brushed against his exposed shoulder, hoping it might ground him and keep him present.  It worked momentarily; the static faded, briefly, before blaring back as a dizzying mess.

“Happy birthday,” Enjolras mothed against Grantaire’s collar bone.

Christ. It was his birthday. He’d almost forgotten. Grantaire screwed his eyes shut and willed himself not to Travel. He knew exactly where he was slipping off to and it was the last place he wanted to go. But it was all pointless. He felt his limbs tingling and just managed to plant a kiss on Enjolras’ forehead before the room dissolved and he was plunged into the snow.

_February, 1982 (Grantaire is 34, 10, 12 and various)_

Grantaire sat up and blinked, he was still half asleep and the sudden temperature drop wasn’t helping to orientate himself. It took a few more blinks for his brain to kick in and for him to realise that he was in a forest with thick boughs of snow covered trees drooping either side of him. For a moment, he almost thought he’d lucked out and Travelled to the meadow, before he heard the low thrum of nearby traffic and spotted the neon signs of a strip mall through the trees. Shivering against the cold, he picked his way towards the bright lights. 

The gas station and small row of shops were all too familiar, and any hope he had that he might have Travelled somewhere – anywhere – else immediately vanished. He made his way towards the back of the discount clothes store with a heavy heart, glancing at the placement of the moon as he went. It was low in the sky, bright and full, tinged yellow as it hung above the road. It was still early, then; Grantaire was going to be just in time.

The road was icy. Large drifts of snow lined the ribbon of tarmac on both sides and deadly black ice frosted the top. Grantaire was forced to pick his way carefully down the road, keeping to the banks of snow to prevent him from skidding uncontrollably on to his face. His feet grew quickly numb. 

Thankfully the back door of the store was still ajar, the lock already picked by a younger incarnation of Grantaire loping around somewhere in the shadows. He slipped into the dark store and padded between the rows of clothes, navigating the aisles by memory. He pulled a pair of thick jeans and a sweater from their neatly folded piles on the shelves, wiped his snow-soaked feet on a bath towel, and found himself some warm socks and heavy duty boots. He did feel a slight pang of remorse for the poor shop assistant who would be blamed for not locking up properly the night before. One day Grantaire would think about settling his debts, but right now he had more pressing things to worry about. He swiped a winter coat from a rack by the door and stepped back out into the night.

The moon had tracked higher in the sky. Grantaire stared at it, glowing brightly through the tops of the trees. What would happen if just walked away, he wondered? If he followed the road north instead of south? It was an idle consideration, though. Grantaire knew he was powerless to ignore the tug that pulled him back towards the moment anchored at the centre of his Travels. The scene that plagued his nightmares and haunted him ceaselessly since the day he turned ten.

All too soon the outline of the road bridge loomed faintly on the road ahead. It looked eery, painted grey by the moonlight and rising from the darkness like a ghost from his worst nightmares. A second road twisted below. Grantaire had just stepped out onto the bridge when a pair of headlights breached the corner of the road below and he heard the loud blare of a truck horn from behind him. He didn’t need to turn to see a lorry sliding on the icy, he already knew the look of panic on the driver’s face as he stomped frantically on the brake pedal. Instead, Grantaire focused on the little blue car in front of him, illuminated by the headlights of the truck. He saw  - or remembered - fear flash across his mother’s face. He watched her try to brake, watched her spin the wheel so they’d hit the truck side on, shielding her son – him – so that she’d take the brunt of the collision, not realising that it was pointless, that Grantaire had already Travelled.

“No!” A voice broke through the chaos. Grantaire’s voice, but younger, vulnerable and panicked.

The truck hit the car, which crumpled under the force of the collision. The sound of metal screaching against metal filled the air. Glass and ice shattered and plastic crunched. Grantaire forced himself to look away and turned instead to see a younger version of himself fall to his knees on the bridge beside him. 

“It’s alright,” he said once silence fell. He spoke without conviction, but because that’s what the older man on the bridge had said to him all those years ago. He crossed to the boy kneeling in the snow. He was twelve, still reeling with the fresh grief of his mother’s death. His dark hair was unkempt, swept across his face in a haphazard mop of curls, and he was skinnier than any twelve-year-old boy had the right to be. Grantaire removed his coat and draped around the shoulders of his younger self, engulfing him in the thick downy fabric.

“It’ll be okay,” he lied; echoing the words he’d already said. The boy stared up at him, for a moment unsure, before he recognised Grantaire and threw himself at him. Grantaire embraced himself reluctantly; aching with painful memories as he felt his younger self sob in his arms.

“I keep coming back,” the younger Grantaire whimpered, “Why? Why I can’t I stop it?”

“I don’t know.”

“I miss her, I miss mom.” His voice broke and he descended into painful, heart wrenching sobs once more.

“Me too.” He held his younger self, letting him cry as the scene unfolded around them. Soon the flashing blue lights and sirens of emergency vehicles peeled down the road; responding far sooner than they usually would – phoned for minutes before the crash had even happened by a seventeen year old Grantaire who had managed to find a phone.

After the road had been cordoned off and the ambulances had left, the police came to find them on the bridge. They marked the pair of them down as a father and son, witnesses to the crash, and took a statement from the older Grantaire, whilst his younger self continued to sob. Grantaire didn’t try to shush him, he didn’t tell him to pull himself to together and he didn’t chide him for crying. He remembered how much he needed to cry, and remembered the sharp sting of his father’s words whenever he’d sought comfort at home. (“You should miss her! It’s your fucking fault she’s gone!”). This chance to cry and be comforted had been the cathartic release he’d needed to finally begin to move on.    

They sat on the bridge long after the ambulances, the police, and the fire crews had gone, long after the road had been closed to await the clean-up crews who would arrive in the morning. Eventually the younger Grantaire cried himself to sleep, and dissolved in Grantaire’s arms.

The coat flopped, empty, in his lap and Grantaire curled his fingers in the soft fabric. Finding himself suddenly alone, the weight of his emotions crashed over him. His eyes welled up and his throat grew tight, but he wouldn’t let himself cry. There’d been enough of that already this evening. Instead he forced himself to stand and brushed the snow from his legs. The knees of his jeans were soaked through with melted snow, but he hardly noticed. He gathered up the coat and slipped it back over his shoulders, zipping it up to his neck and tucking his chin below the collar.

The scene of the road below him look eerie and tragic; the shells of two broken vehicles, scrap metal and broken glass littered everywhere. For some unfathomable reason Grantaire found himself slipping down the bank of the road to walk around the remnants of his mom’s car. The driver’s door had been sawn off and was lying in pieces on the road. He kicked it, sending a metallic clang echoing into the night. He’d never hung around this long afterwards before. Ordinarily he’d have Travelled back to whatever miserable year he was from long before now. Typical that the one time he had something to look forward to at home and he was stuck in this miserably memory even longer.

He picked his way through the debris, his boots crunching on the glass and ice. It seemed tragic that his mom’s life had been reduced to this. Everything she’d done, everything she’d worked her. Her hopes, dreams…all brought to an abrupt halt. Ended by an unlucky encounter with a truck on an icy road. It was sickeningly unfair and suddenly Grantaire felt weak on his feet. For the first time – stupidly, and by god, he felt guilty and foolish for not considering it before – he realised that she’d been a person in her own right. She was more than just his mom. The injustice he was forced to witness over and over again wasn’t just a young boy losing his mother, but a young woman losing her life.

He’d always assumed, as you do when you’re ten, that his mom was old, that she knew everything, that she’d seen everything. But standing on the spot where the stretcher had carried her away – Grantire realised that she’d been the same age that he was now.

As countless other versions of himself had that evening, Grantaire fell to his knees and cried into the snow.

=

_February 2006 (Grantaire is 34, Enjolras is 30)_

Enjolras’ side of the bed was cold by the time Grantaire crashed back to his present. He knelt on the bed, the duvet tangled around his ankles, and took a moment to pull himself together. He felt weak and his hands were shaking from the weight of his emotions. It had been years since he’d been back to that spot, he’d thought he was done with it, or at least thought he’d witnessed all of the horrors that night had to offer him. Apparently not.

Finally feeling strong enough to move, he climbed off the bed and stood, dazed, staring at the window. It was still light, and the glow of Enjolras’ alarm clock told him that thankfully he’d only missed a few hours. Letting out a deep juddering sigh, Grantaire tried to pull himself together. it was a Sunday, they both had the day off, and it was still early; they deserved to make the most of it.

He showered under a torrent of hot steam to wash the memory of snow from his skin, and dressed in a thick pair of jeans and a maroon sweater that Enjolras liked to borrow and which consequently smelt like him. As he hunted around in a drawer for a thick pair of socks, he came across the small rectangular business card Combeferre had given his back in July. He stared at it.

 _Dr Joly, Professor of Human Genetics, The University of Chicago Medicine, e: jjoly@genetics.uchicago.edu, t:_ _(773) 834-9110_

For the first time Grantaire managed to read the name without an uneasy sense of dread rising in his gut. He’d taken it out a few times since Combeferre had given it him . Each time it had been stuffed hastily back into the drawer. Once, back in December, Grantaire had made it as far as ringing to an appointment , before he bottled. The look on Enjolras’ face had been heartbreaking after he saw R struggling with a dislocated knee. So much so, that after Enjolras had fallen asleep that night, Grantaire had vowed never again. He impulsively called the office number on the business card and left a message asking for a meeting.

But when the admin desk had called him back at a more reasonable time in the morning, Grantaire’s courage had waned. And he cancelled. He’d been passed through a series of specialists and analysts between the ages of 5 and 8 – when he’d thrown a fit and pleaded no more. He’d had enough. Despite his mother’s faith in science, her insistence that there would be a scientific explaination for what was happening, nothing worked. No one knew what to do with him, so they mostly did blood tests, scans, and psychological exams. One inspired person had thought Grantaire might be having hallucinogenic reactions to common household items. He’d ordered Grantaire to be confined to a hermetically sealed room for a week to prove his theory. Of course, Grantaire have Travelled after a little more than four hours. But rather than believe him, the doctor reprimanded him for breaking out.

Seriously, some of the so-called ‘specialists’ had been the most stupid people Grantaire had ever met. Maybe this guy would be different. Grantaire wasn’t hopeful, but he trusted Combeferre’s judgement. He could at least test the waters, he reasoned. What harm could it do? All he knew was that enduring another Trip back to the crash was going to be damn near unbearable. If this guy could help….in any way, then Grantaire would be a fool to ignore him.

He pocketed the card and swept his hair across his forehead, ambling downstairs to find Enjolras.

“You’re back,” Enjolras smiled. He was sitting on the kitchen table, his laptop in front of him, and piles of paper towering by his elbow. The morning sunlight fell through the window, flooding the kitchen with warmth, whilst the coffee maker rumbled away on the counter. “I thought I heard the shower.”

Grantaire answered by stepping behind Enjolras and draping himself around Enjolras’ shoulders in a hug. He rested his chin on Enjolras’ head and closed his eyes against the glare of the laptop screen. Screens had been known to trigger him in the past; it’s why he steered clear of the TV. Of course, it might just have been a coincidence, there was never a clear rhyme nor reason as to why Grantaire Travelled, but he clung to the coincidences as a means of coping.

As if he’d read Grantaire’s mind, Enjolras closed the lip on his laptop and snaked his hands up to hold onto Grantaire’s. “Happy Birthday.”

“Hmm.”

“Where’d you go?”

“Nowhere fun.”

“The…crash?” Enjolras’ tone was hesitant.

“Yeah.” Grantaire untangled himself and sloped towards the coffee maker.

“I’m sorry.”

“Me too.” He pulled two mugs down from the cupboard and set them on the counter. “You know she was my age?”

“Hm?”

“My Mom. She was 34 when she died.”

Enjolras looked stunned for a moment. His eyebrow quirked into an arch as he struggled to find an appropriate response. “That’s young.” He settled on eventually.

“Too young,” Grantaire agreed. He dipped his head and frowned at the floor.

“What did she do?” Enjolras asked quietly. “You’ve never really told me about her.”

“I guess I never really wanted to talk about it.” Grantaire admitted. He wasn’t sure if that was still the case. He distracted himself by pouring out two mugs of coffee, adding cream to Enjolras’ and sugar to his.

Enjolras stood up and crossed the kitchen to take coffee and the proceeded to grab Grantaire by the hand and pull him towards the living room to curl up on the sofa.

Settled on the comfortable cushions, basking in the glow of the bright winter morning, with Enjolras tucked against his side, Grantaire found that he didn’t mind talking about it. “She was a teacher.” He told Enjolras. “Though I think she could have been something big in the science world if I hadn’t come along to scupper her plans. She’d just started her masters in chemistry when she fell pregnant.” He paused to drink and gather his thoughts. “My dad was one of her math professors, there was a big scandal at the university. So they left. Decided to get married and moved to Maine. My dad started teaching at the local community college and whilst my Mom was looking after me she studied to be a teacher. She started teaching chemistry at the high school when I started kindergarten.” 

It actually felt good to be talking about her, and suddenly memories Grantaire didn’t know he had came bubbling to the surface: helping her prep an experiment which involved setting balloons on fire, curled by her side whilst she graded papers, ‘helping’ her judge the winners of the school science fair when he was barely able to see over the tops of the tables. Christ he missed her.

“They were both too clever to be where they were, but they seemed happy.” He continued, sinking down into his seat and tilting to lean his head on Enjolras’ should. “My dad was absolutely besotted with her. He would never begrudge her anything – he couldn’t blame her for losing his tenure, so he blamed me instead. They were the smartest people I ever met. Except, maybe, Combeferre, or Feuilly.”

He took another sip and let the memoies wash over him. “They used to do the Sunday crossword in under ten minutes – you know, the impossible the cryptic one? I’d watch them pull words from nowhere, laughing and smiling as they did. I’d have a go sometimes, but I never got the hang of them.” He trailed off.

“You’re too literary,” Enjolras smiled, tracing circles into Grantaire’s arms. 

Too literary, or rather too non-science minded, thought Grantaire, which had been the cause of an unceasing rift between him as his father. But he didn’t want to think about that; not today.

“I’ve never understood why having a mathematical brain makes you better at crosswords. It seems backwards.”

“I think it’s to do with calculating the letters.” Enjolras answered fondly. “It’s why Combeferre will always beat me at scrabble, no matter what I do.”

“Seems unfair.”

“Mhm,” Enjolras hummed his agreement. “Your mom sounds like she was lovely.”

“She was.” Grantaire said softly. “She deserved so much better.”

Enjolras didn’t have anything to say to that, so he stayed quiet for a beat. Trying to picture her, trying to conjure a rounded idea of her from the little he knew.

“What do you want to do today?” he asked after a while. “I told the others we were on radio silence.”

Grantaire threaded his fingers through Enjolras’ and brush his thumb across the back of Enjolras’ palm.

“Thank you.” For understanding, for not pushing him, for not writing off their day together after he’d Travelled in the morning. For waiting. For always waiting. Maybe if Grantaire could force himself to see that doctor Enjolras wouldn’t have to waste his life waiting any longer. That possibility alone would make it worthwhile. No matter what tests Grantaire would be subjected to, no matter that he risked ridicule or worse; Grantaire would suffer a world of indignities for the chance to make Enjolras’ life easier.

“I don’t mind what we do. As long as I’m with you I’m happy,” Grantaire said with a smug smile. Enjolras could make him damn corny sometimes, but he loved it. They both loved it.

The clouds shifted outside and a faint patter of rain made itself known on the windows.

“Fancy a game of scrabble?” Enjolras suggested. “I may not be able to beat Combeferre, but I’m pretty certain I can beat you.”

“Oh yeah?”

“Oh yeah.” Enjolras grinned and arched across to kiss Grantaire tenderly. When he pulled away there was a glint of competitive mischief in his eyes which made Grantaire’s heart sing.

Oh yes. There was nothing he wouldn’t do for Enjolras.

**Author's Note:**

> More warnings:  
> This chapter deals with Grantaire's mom's death.
> 
> =
> 
>  
> 
> [Tumblr!](http://trenchcoatsandtimetravel.tumblr.com/)


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